


third star on the right and straight on 'til morning

by merlypops



Category: 5 Seconds of Summer (Band)
Genre: Angst, Anxiety, Depression, Friends to Lovers, Heavy Angst, I'm Sorry, M/M, Sad, Sad Ending, Suicidal Thoughts, Suicide, Suicide Attempt, Triggers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-22
Updated: 2015-03-22
Packaged: 2018-03-19 04:01:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,488
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3595566
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/merlypops/pseuds/merlypops
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>'Everything was too scary now, only Luke wasn't around to help Calum anymore, so the shadows were closing in and blocking out the sunlight, and the grief was choking the air from Calum's lungs like icy fingers wrapping around the dark-haired boy's throat.'</p><p>
  <b>Luke has gone forever but all Calum wants is to find him again... only it doesn't work out that way.</b>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	third star on the right and straight on 'til morning

**Author's Note:**

  * For [kittenmichael](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kittenmichael/gifts).



> This is really, really horrible but I wrote it for Astrid because she's almost as mean as me when it comes to fics (and I love her).  
> Astrid, I hope this is everything you wanted.  
> Um... if you're sad... don't read this please...

_**Talk to yourself, talk to the tears,** _

_**Talk to the man who put you here,** _

_**And don’t wait for the sky to clear.** _

_\- Come In With The Rain, Taylor Swift_

 

That was the thing about losing someone.

You never realised how much you appreciated them until they weren't around anymore.

That was how Calum Hood felt now, staring down into the open casket as the lump in his throat threatened to choke him and leave him as dead as the beautiful _empty_ boy lying limp in the coffin.

The birds were singing in the woodland outside. There were planes soaring overhead and cars driving down the road with people sitting behind the steering wheels.

"Calum, it's time to go."

Mali-Koa's voice went in one ear and out of the other. Calum was too busy counting the individual golden eyelashes fanned out on the ashen cheeks of the boy lying below him.

"There's seven minutes until -"

Calum heard his mother's voice behind him but he didn't process what she was saying.

Seven minutes.

Seven.

There were seven billion people in the world, all going about their own lives without a care for the beautiful broken boy lying slumped in the coffin.

He didn't _look_ like he was sleeping. Calum had read that somewhere but it just wasn't _true_.

Luke Hemmings looked **dead.**

There had only been so much they could do to hide the bruising on his neck. It still looked like he'd hanged himself.

It still made Calum feel like his heart had been ripped out of his chest and set ablaze in front of him.

It still felt like _Calum_ had been the one to snap his own neck instead of his lifelong best friend.

Calum privately thought that it always _would_.

"It's time to say goodbye, son."

That was Calum's father. His hand was a heavy weight on Calum's shoulder, _crushing_ him.

" _I c-can't_."

Calum's breathing was ragged and his words were harsh. Calum's father stepped away when he saw the turmoil in his son's eyes, and Mali-Koa replaced him, cupping her younger brother's face gently with her small hands.

"You'll never forgive yourself if you don't say goodbye, Calum."

Her words were soft and fair. Calum wanted her to stop touching him. He wanted her to scream at him, to claw his face until he bled so that he might actually be able to feel something other than that awful hollow _ache_ he could feel spreading inside him, like a disease creeping beneath his skin, _destroying_ him.

He felt emptier than Luke was now.

"That's... not _h-him_ anymore," Calum whispered and Mali-Koa's beautiful chocolate brown eyes swam with tears.

She still looked so calm though, so _collected_.

Calum did too though, he supposed, to an outsider at least. He was numb and grey and _faded_.

He'd barely slept since Luke had - _fuck_ \- killed himself two weeks ago.

Calum felt like a zombie.

"You need some air," Mali-Koa murmured, slipping her arm around Calum's shoulders and leading him out of the church.

He hated the smell of her flowery perfume and the warm, comforting, _crippling_ weight of her arm pressing down on him.

He hated that everyone thought they knew what was best for him now that Luke was gone and Calum had no one.

"You'll feel better in a minute, Calum," Mali-Koa said unthinkingly. Calum blinked against the sudden onslaught of sunlight.

The golden rays looked like Luke's blond quiffed hair. The sky blue of the sky mirrored Luke's eyes - eyes that had once been bright and shining with laughter, but were now glazed and empty behind lavender eyelids that would never flutter open again.

The pink rosebuds on the bushes outside were as pale as Luke's lips.

Calum and Luke had kissed once.

The pair of them had been wandering home from school and it had happened when they lingered on the way home. Luke had ducked his head and pressed a gentle kiss to the dark haired boy's mouth.

Calum thought about that now, _remembered_.

He'd known Luke since they were both three but Luke had only kissed him when they were seventeen.

Calum wondered what had changed.

He wondered _why_.

"Calum?" Mali-Koa murmured.

Calum's trembling fingers fell from his full lips. His eyes were boiling with tears that refused to fall.

He couldn't breathe anymore.

Everywhere he looked, he was reminded of the beautiful boy who'd left him behind and gone on the biggest adventure yet - _without Calum_.

That was something they'd always promised never to do.

They'd learnt to ride their bikes together when they were kids. They'd made cookies and played football and gone on a school trip to Brazil.

They'd said they were going to do _everything_ together, right down to being the best man at each other's weddings.

Then Luke had kissed him and killed himself, and Calum had been left with no one.

Calum didn't know why Luke had seen fit to take himself away.

He thought about Luke's piercing blue eyes - dull now, and _empty_ \- and he remembered that Luke hated the taste of apricots but loved the sound of the rain pounding on the tin roof of his father's shed.

Calum remembered the taste of Luke's mouth and the gentle fluttering of Luke's cool fingertips on his cheekbone, as delicate as a butterfly almost, and just as fragile.

Calum wondered where Luke was now, wondered if he was sleeping or if he was somewhere else, wandering along a pebbly beach or an empty highway or down a winding path in a thick, misty forest somewhere, obscured by the trees.

Calum remembered watching Peter Pan with Luke when they were just little kids.

' _Third star on the right and straight on 'til morning._ '

Calum had watched that film for the first time during a sleepover with Luke.

They'd held hands and shared a big mattress on the floor, and they'd snuggled up together when the cold and the dark of Calum's living room got too scary for them.

Everything was too scary now, only Luke wasn't around to help Calum anymore, so the shadows were closing in and blocking out the sunlight, and the grief was choking the air from Calum's lungs like icy fingers wrapping around the dark-haired boy's throat.

He needed the choking sensation to leave him. He needed the fucking _emptiness_ to drain away, to be filled with _life_ again.

Even _pain_ would be better than this.

**Pain.**

Calum could do that.

He shrugged off Mali-Koa's arm from around his shoulders, heading towards the gates that led back out onto the main road... to _reality_.

Calum didn't want reality though.

He wanted _Luke_ back and... and if he couldn't have Luke then he wanted -

 **Fuck**.

Calum wanted to run in front of a car. He wanted to weigh himself down with rocks and throw himself off a cliff into the churning ocean below.

He wanted to take a gun and hold it to his head and pull the trigger.

Calum wanted to snap his _own_ neck, like Luke had done two weeks ago when life had grown too much for him.

Life was too much for Calum now. He didn't want it anymore.

"Calum?" Mali-Koa called from the graveyard.

Calum didn't look back. He _couldn't_.

' _Third star on the right and straight on 'til morning._ '

He was so close to Luke now. He could almost taste it, could almost feel Luke's small hands curling around his own and anchoring him so that they would never be parted again.

"Calum, stop! Mum, he's - _Calum_!"

The tarmac was rough beneath Calum's black leather shoes. The sun was beating down and making sweat form on his forehead, and Calum _should_ have felt like he was alive then, as he gasped for air and fought to contain his suddenly-overwhelming panic but he just... _didn't._

He was existing.

He was without Luke.

He'd lost him.

A car sounded its horn then as it sped along and the screech of its brakes was loud enough that Calum winced. The noise made his teeth jump and goosebumps rise on his arms.

It sent a thrill of fear through him as stood on the highway with his arms outstretched.

The car had no time to stop.

Calum didn't stand a chance.

He braced himself for the moment of impact but it didn't seem to come.

There was simply darkness - like storm clouds rolling over and hiding the sun - and then Calum was airborne.

He didn't feel when he hit the road. He didn't hear Mali-Koa's screams or the driver calling for an ambulance.

Calum didn't witness any of it because all he could feel, as his heart slowly shuddered to a halt, was the worst numbness yet because... because there was nothing at all - no Luke, no third star on the right... no _nothing_ \- and Calum felt something then, for the first time in what felt like _forever_.

He felt **regret**.

**Author's Note:**

> *waits in terror for someone to start shouting*
> 
> I'm sorry.


End file.
